Sports Beat: He built something from nothing

By Pat McCann

Published: Sunday, September 16, 2012 at 04:25 PM.

But this is what Jim Calhoun did: Build something out of nothing.

Calhoun made many of us commit to memory the city of Storrs, which possibly is his most remarkable achievement. He somehow recruited elite players to a state whose premier athletes previously attended Yale. To a place that was known mainly for cows and snow drifts, and a region that basically attracts New Yorkers tired of living in the city.

This much for Podunk, too. While Storrs is your basic metro punch line, neither is it known for its war-zone ghettoes, rush-hour gridlock or Spring Break tragedies.

Because of Calhoun and Auriemma, hired only one year apart in the athletic director coup of the century, it became synonymous with excellence in college basketball. Give Calhoun credit for his contribution to that, if you’re not willing to give him anything else.

Then consider, briefly, how much he’d care. This is a man who successfully battled prostate cancer in 2003 and skin cancer twice, most recently in 2008.

Calhoun was hospitalized in 2009 after breaking several ribs during a charity bike ride and he missed seven games in the 2009-10 season for an undisclosed stress-related medical reason. He coached a game four days after having back surgery.

He got back on the bicycle to finish the charity ride in 2009, but his latest bike mishap resulted in a fractured hip. To be truthful, it probably gave him an out to retire following a 15-month NCAA investigation and with the Huskies failing to academically qualify for the 2013 NCAA tournament.

There is a puncher’s chance that Jim Calhoun could walk into a gathering that included Alex Rodriguez, John Sununu and Simon Cowell and be considered the least likeable person in the room.

Presumably that wouldn’t bother Calhoun. He wasn’t concerned with popularity contests. He was concerned with winning basketball games. And championships.

Until Thursday.

Calhoun announced his retirement from coaching the University of Connecticut men’s basketball team. It wasn’t because of his age, now 70. It wasn’t because he doubted his ability to continue orchestrating a major-college behemoth through another challenging season. Men who accept the enormity of molding an athletic program in a place few ever have heard of aren’t daunted by age or task.

Neither was it because of cancer, which Calhoun already has survived.

It was because of his inability to ride a bicycle without drastic circumstances befalling him. Or more succinctly, him falling off said bicycle.

Jim Calhoun might not have been media friendly or gotten along with officials, those fashioning ties as well as striped shirts. His players might not have had a preferred graduation rate. He might not even have gotten along with Geno Auriemma, the man located down the hall from Calhoun who sculpted UConn’s women’s basketball program into a powerhouse.

But this is what Jim Calhoun did: Build something out of nothing.

Calhoun made many of us commit to memory the city of Storrs, which possibly is his most remarkable achievement. He somehow recruited elite players to a state whose premier athletes previously attended Yale. To a place that was known mainly for cows and snow drifts, and a region that basically attracts New Yorkers tired of living in the city.

This much for Podunk, too. While Storrs is your basic metro punch line, neither is it known for its war-zone ghettoes, rush-hour gridlock or Spring Break tragedies.

Because of Calhoun and Auriemma, hired only one year apart in the athletic director coup of the century, it became synonymous with excellence in college basketball. Give Calhoun credit for his contribution to that, if you’re not willing to give him anything else.

Then consider, briefly, how much he’d care. This is a man who successfully battled prostate cancer in 2003 and skin cancer twice, most recently in 2008.

Calhoun was hospitalized in 2009 after breaking several ribs during a charity bike ride and he missed seven games in the 2009-10 season for an undisclosed stress-related medical reason. He coached a game four days after having back surgery.

He got back on the bicycle to finish the charity ride in 2009, but his latest bike mishap resulted in a fractured hip. To be truthful, it probably gave him an out to retire following a 15-month NCAA investigation and with the Huskies failing to academically qualify for the 2013 NCAA tournament.

The breadth of compassion and depth of soul of Jim Calhoun aren’t intimately known to this corner, or probably anyone reading this morning. All we received from afar were terse postgame comments and crusty bench behavior during games.

It is possible that he preserved his humanity for the inner circle and those closest to his heart; family, including his players.

For the rest of us, he deposited gruff and tough into our memory banks and didn’t feel the need to make any withdrawals.